Obama’s Short Mention of Immigration May be a Good Thing
By Victor Landa, NewsTaco
I’m of two minds when it comes to President Obama’s State of the Union speech, especially when it comes to immigration reform.
On the one hand, he spoke all of ten seconds on the subject so it seemed like an afterthought.
On the other, both sides of the aisle clapped and seemed, at least last night, to be open to the idea of tackling immigration reform in the near future.
And maybe that’s the better signal: the fact that no more than 10 seconds were needed on an item that all agree has the best chance for approval. Why spend more time on it if it’s on a good road to consideration?
Then again, both sides rose to their feet and clapped on the issue of equal pay for women … and nothing’s been done on that front yet.
Many immigration activists were waiting for a clarion call for comprehensive immigration reform. They wanted a strong call to action. They wanted the President to raise their cause. They wanted more than ten seconds, and they were left wanting.
But in a speech that was more platitude than substance, maybe ten seconds is better than fifteen or thirty. The President’s statement on immigration is not going to change the debate, it won’t tilt the momentum or convince the opposition. It was more a statement of the obvious and both Democrats and Republicans aren’t backing away from that fact. The political calculations remain the same, so the questions remain unchanged:
- Will immigration reform happen?
- How soon?
- How will it happen?
If anyone was looking for an answer to those questions in President Obama’s State of the Union speech, they were looking in the wrong place.
The reason for the President’s short immigration mention may be as short as the mention itself.
But there were other issues important to Latinos in the U.S. where President Obama was more emphatic:
- Extending unemployment benefits
- Reforming student loan structures
- Infrastructure spending
- Raising the minimum wage
On all of these issues the President called on congress to act, and he used up more ticks on to do so.
So is it a matter of emphasis and time, interpreted as attention and importance?
This isn’t a State of the Union speech that will go down in history as watershed oratory. And if immigration reform happens, it’ll take longer than ten seconds.
[Photo by United States Government Work]